Do Americans not get sick leave?? What’s your sick leave policy?

[Youngandfree]

Just that really and posting here for traffic? I’m forever seeing posts on Facebook etc from ppl in the US (and actually sometimes uk) about how they are sick all week and so they have no pay from work?? Surely if under a permanent contract then you have sick leave allowance, I can understand in some jobs (0 hour contracts etc). Genuinely interested, not criticizing! I have known ppl in jobs to be off for months at a time with back problems/stress etc and they have been paid. What’s your Sick leave policy?
Mine is as follows:
For an ordinary illness, a teacher has access to 183 days of paid sick leave in a rolling four year period. This is subject to a further limit of 92 days of full pay in any single twelve month period. After 92 days full pay sick leave in a twelve month period, the teacher will move on to half pay.

I work in care and we get statutory sick pay.

No idea about USA but they seem to get paid a lot more than us for the same job.

My Job was part time, if I was off sick I lost a days pay. I didn't get any paid annual leave either as you had to do 40 hours a week to accumulate leave.
Dh had a full time job, he got 5 paid sick days over a year, after that, no pay if he was off sick.

You don’t work you don’t get paid
Statutory sick pay is all that’s on offer
Uk, full time permanent contract

USA's benefits for sickness and maternity etc are appalling. You're considered lucky if you're able to take 12 weeks unpaid and still have your job. Smaller companies don't have to abide by that so you either go back after like two weeks or risk losing your job. I'm in a Feb bumpers group with a lot of American women and at 11 weeks postpartum a huge number of them are going back to work or have been for several weeks. Some have just had to quit their jobs. They're hugely envious of people in European countries or Canada.

In the us you accuse sick pay like holidays, but the more insecure the employment the worse the terms just like here. Here you are only entitled to statutory sick pay, most places offer better but it's not a right

@Troels

Are you in the U.K.?

I get 26 weeks paid sickness per tax year, lower grade staff get 13 weeks paid sickness - private sector

Most places I’ve worked have been SSP only so a generous scheme is rare

America is ‘at will’ employment vs contract employment in the UK. With this, an employee or an employer can terminate the employment at any time, barring discrimination etc.

This means if you are an hourly worker, you only get paid the hours you work, so if you take time off it may not be paid. However, if you are a salaried employee rather than hourly, you will have paid sick leave and paid holiday.

I have a professional qualification, work in the field I am qualified in and only get SSP , we also lose £50 from our attendance bonus if we take a day of sick or no notice (school shut/child sick etc), we have hardly any sickness in work because of this (we do however have people in who really would be better off staying home )

When i broke my hand i was told if i didn't take holiday i wouldn't get paid any commission from deals that had already gone though that month and deals that were in my pipeline. I had to have lots of therapy and had to take holiday to go to appointments. Left that job as soon as i could.
Current employer is in Portugal, if i have the odd day off sick then she's fine about paying me. I had an infection and was really ill 2 years ago and had a week off, she still paid me.

Most states don't have any laws that say sick pay has to be paid. Some places offer a couple of sick days a year that you can 'bank' if not needed and accumulate them for later use. I get 8 PTO (personal time off) days a year which can be used for when children are sick, sick leave, as well as vacation - by US standards that's a great deal.

I’m 40, and have a degree in my field I work full time In a private nursery and have been there 13 years. We get zero work sick pay, only SSP. We’re on permanent contracts.

@Troels - how long ago was this bit ? I didn't get any paid annual leave either as you had to do 40 hours a week to accumulate leave. because that's illegal (assuming you are in the UK) leave is accrued pro rata

calculate - and ask for your money ""How many hours have been worked in this leave year? The holiday entitlement may be calculated as the leave builds up ('accrues') for each hour worked.""

[https://www.gov.uk/calculate-your-holiday-entitlement/y]]

Good god some of those are harsh 😭

oops [https://www.gov.uk/calculate-your-holiday-entitlement/y]

double oops FFS !!! www.gov.uk/calculate-your-holiday-entitlement/y

No idea about USA but they seem to get paid a lot more than us for the same job it's so they can pay for their healthcare more than likely! You're lucky if you get paid holiday leave there.

Workplace rights in the US are bloody disgusting. Being At Will means they can be sacked instantly got pretty much anything. I read Legal Advice on reddit and some of the stories are awful.

I don't know how they cope when pregnant and after giving birth

Whrn i was in retail we only got ssp but that only kicked in after 5 days, so most of the time it was unpaid.

Civil service now and get full pay

We have our sick leave as stated above and also these “family leave” allowances on top of that

Well according to many posters on MN, you should drag yourself into work when sick so sick pay is irrelevant.

2 weeks full pay and an extra week per full year worked up to a maximum of 5 weeks.

2 days paid for emergencies (roof leak/childcare etc.)

Discretionary compassionate leave depending on circumstances (eg a colleague’s husband was seriously ill and she had 3 months full pay and job kept open for a year).

Not the best but far from the worst. Very little sickness. No one has had disciplinary for sickness since I’ve been there (5 years).

Note that for the UK if you only get SSP it means the first three days are unpaid, so in practice many people's short term sicknesses of a day or two are unpaid.

As an aside - the SSP rules are, like our tax system, fucking unbelievably complicated and date from the 1940s. In that time the only major change has been to stop employers being able to get the cost of SSP back from the government (which happened around the 1990s IIRC).

Brit in the US. DH gets 7 sick days and 15 vacation days a year. On a 40 hour a week salary contract. He gets paid double what he was on in the UK.

Health insurance comes out of his salary @$70 per family member per paycheck